Council approves contract to process and haul waste to landfill

Oregon City Council on Monday approved a contract with Midwest Compost, Inc., to process and haul treated sludge from the wastewater treatment plant to an Ohio EPA approved landfill.

The purpose of the contract is to dewater a portion of liquid sludge and to provide additional volume storage for Phase 1 of the wastewater treatment plant secondary treatment improvement project, which calls for an increase in treatment capacity from 24 million gallons per day to 36 million gallons per day to eliminate secondary treatment bypasses and sanitary sewer collection system overflows during wet weather events.

The scope of work will include the contractor bringing in a portable belt filter press to dewater or dry the sludge. The work will also include the contractor hauling the sludge to a landfill.

“The city still plans to land apply our liquid sludge through the farming program and we’ll likely bid that work out in May,” said Roman. “That work normally takes place in July and August. But we need to dewater the sludge now because the Phase 1 of the Secondary Treatment Improvement Project is ongoing.”

To dewater sludge on a permanent basis would require a large capital improvement project, said Roman.

“We do have money in the budget that was allocated to study different alternatives for dewatering and to do a feasibility study or a preliminary design for that work. I do plan to get RFPs [Request for Proposals] out to have a consultant to do that design work. This is just a means to provide more storage for the current construction project. But that doesn’t mean we’re not looking at this as a permanent solution as well. One thing to keep in mind is if we were to do a capital improvement of dewatering, you would still want to keep alternatives open to land apply liquid sludge You can still do it in various locations, much further away from residential properties or from any other concerns that the city may have. It still is accepted by many farmers as a very good fertilizer for their crops,” said Roman.

Bridge inspection

Also at the meeting, council approved an agreement with the Ohio Department of Transportation (ODOT) to conduct bridge inspection for the city.

“It’s at no cost to the city,” said Roman. “The Department of Public Service currently inspects the city’s bridges. We are up to date with the basic or required inspection work. We do have a few smaller bridges that really need an update for load rating calculations. This is really a test for structural strength. Normally, that’s done by a structural engineer. Our larger bridges have always been done by ODOT as well as Lucas County Engineers Department. But currently the Federal Highway Administration has changed some of the requirements for the inspections and ODOT is going across the state and offering this new program to do bridge inspections to bring everybody up to the new Federal Highway Administration’s standard.”

Clean Energy

City Administrator Mike Beazley also gave an update to council on the Oregon Clean Energy Project, an $800 million megawatt energy generation facility that will be built on North Lallendorf Road.

Company officials were in town last week to meet with Beazley and Mayor Mike Seferian.

“We feel good about their timeline and they’re continuing to work on detailed issues,” said Beazley. “They have two finalists they’re selecting for their construction and engineering procurement companies. They are in the process of working through those issues over the next 30 days. I feel strong and positive on the project and its impact on our economy as we go forward.”

The project is expected to create about 450 construction jobs over three years, and 26 new full-time, permanent jobs once the facility begins operations, with a total annual payroll of about $3.2 million.

Beazley also gave an update on the city’s infrastructure following record breaking snow and sub zero temperatures this winter.

“It’s been hard on our infrastructure. We’ll go out and take a look at our streets and make sure we devote the resources to get them in shape. It’s been a rough season,” he said.